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Creating Polyglots Via The Internet

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As an undergraduate German major at the University of Kentucky and a prize-winning writer in English, Paige Daniel Ware was surprised when the written intricacies of a foreign tongue did not come as easily as verbal fluency. Her second language flowed more naturally in conversation than it spilled onto the page, an experience that influences her research involving young English learners who often have “to perform [in school] in a language in which they are not yet proficient.” Now an assistant professor in SMU’s Annette Caldwell Simmons School of Education and Human Development, Ware received a 2006 Ford Fellowship for her research on the integration of instructional technologies, particularly Web-based tools and applications, into second language learning and teaching. In support of further research in this area, she recently received a prestigious National Academy of Education Spencer Fellowship for a two-year project involving adolescent English language learners in the United States and their peers in Spain who are learning English as a foreign language.

The first year of the two-phase study will focus on a voluntary after-school program; in the second year, students will participate as part of their regular English language arts classes. Ware’s analysis will consider whether one of the settings is more conducive to literacy and writing development than the other. Because of her ongoing relationships with the Irving ISD and a bilingual school in Granada, Spain, Ware expects to draw about 20 students from each location. Although it’s not yet clear what impact the international component will have, Ware says that at the very least it will provide “an outlet for them, as bilingual students, to communicate with an audience outside of their worlds.”

As “key pals” – the online equivalent of “pen pals” – the students will craft at least 10 exchanges, but they won’t be ordinary e-mails. “The students may write letters, but they’ll have to add multiple hyperlinks to hobby sites, family blogs or other sites,” Ware says. “The second type of exchange will be a multimedia slide show in which they’ll use still images and voice-overs; and the third is a digital story that they’ll create with whatever video editing software is available on their computers.” The multimedia twist to the research serves a dual purpose: as a carrot – “multimedia tends to engage adolescents, so it could be a motivating factor” for some students to participate – and as a measuring stick, of sorts. “Previously the concern was that there are the technology and Internet ‘haves’ and ‘have nots:’ the digital divide. Now we see that despite having computers and access to the Internet at school, students in lower socioeconomic brackets do not perform at the same technical level: the second-level digital divide,” Ware explains. “As a way to close that divide, the study will document how language growth occurs when students engage in purposeful writing with peers” while developing and demonstrating digital literacy.

Ware expects the results to have practical applications for teachers. “The findings should provide evidence that the type of engagement and language use generated around multimedia literacy also can lead to the growth of students’ more traditional writing skills.” A polyglot with a passion for writing, Ware’s interests in languages and learning coalesced at UC Berkeley, where she earned a Ph.D. in education, language, literacy and culture. She also was an instructor in the creative writing program at Berkeley. Before completing her doctorate, she spent time in Germany as a Fulbright scholar and lived in Spain for three years to learn Spanish and teach in a bilingual school.

In addition to her research and teaching, Ware, who has been at SMU since 2003, is the principal investigator of a Department of Education Office of English Language Acquisition (OELA) professional development grant that supports secondary school educators in obtaining their ESL supplemental certification.

For more information: smu.edu/education/teachereducation/faculty/warepaige.asp